me and hit about five or six people. he hit about two people in front and three behind. i would say there are at least four severely injured people. they had paramedics assisting them at the moment. there are about 20 armed police on the bridge at the moment. i am unaware as to where the van driver has gone now. it was a white transit van with one solo male driver. 0ne now. it was a white transit van with one solo male driver. one of the victims was a french lady, 45 years old. she had her boyfriend with her, who we can find at the moment, which is obviously very worrying. nobody really knows what is going on. all the traffic has been halted. how quickly were emergency services there? police arrived probably in two minutes time. there were several people with camera phones who had obviously been taking pictures of tower bridge. police arrived within

two minutes, then the ambulances took about eight minutes. i would say i was probably one of the first people on the scene that called the ambulances. ambulances were here within 6—8 minutes. ambulances. ambulances were here within 6-8 minutes. where is the vehicle? i'm not sure. it's probably central, the middle part of the bridge that it impacted the most. pedestrians, then it carried on up the pavement, around traffic, and carried on towards the shard area. apologies for the noise, you can hear there are helicopters, at least five or six police searching the thames at the moment, all traffic is halted on london bridge. you say police boats are on the river, why would that be? from the way i saw what happened, obviously it all happened quickly. there were about three people behind me. three french

people. these people are being treated by paramedics at the moment. they are injured, she told me in french that they did not know where the other people are. police are checking the edge of the thames. it potentially looks like they could have been thrown over. ijust don't know. presumably boats are there looking for her now. of course, this is horribly reminiscent of what happened on westminster bridge only weeks ago. sirens in the background. how many more weeks ago. sirens in the background. how many more emergency weeks ago. sirens in the background. how many more emergency service vehicles are now arriving? at the moment there are four ambulances, five police cars, they tend to be at each end of the bridge. 0ne

undercover police car in the centre of the bridge where i am standing now. armed guards are running up and down, i don't know what they are doing, but as soon as it happened it reminded me of westminster bridge. we don't know if it is a drink—driver. police are calling me at the moment. holly, don't worry. you obviously need to go and speak to them. thank you very much, these are live pictures from london bridge, right in the centre of the capital. just speaking to holly jones, a bbc reporter who was close to the scene when the incident happened, reuters news agency say armed police were called to london bridge. the area is closed due to a

major police incident, that is what transport for london are saying. we heard from holly that she was one of the first people on the scene who could call emergency services, several people have been hurt. she thinks are several of them have sustained serious injuries, because this white van, she described it as a white transit van, swerved as it was going across the bridge and head maybe five or six people. her assessment was there are several people severely injured. paramedics on the scene with ambulances arriving after eight minutes or so after the alarm was first raised. the driver has gone off, there is no sign of the driver or the van. holly was explaining there are about 20 armed police officers at that point on the bridge. they have thrown a chord and across the —— a cordon

across the bridge. police say they are dealing with an incident. nothing more at the moment. the sun newspaper, quoted by reuters, is reporting that a car, maybe a van, moved down passengers on london bridge. that is what holly described, and she was there —— mowed. she said that there were more armed police arriving in the last few minutes. she could see police officers running across the bridge with their weapons. also police boats on the river thames, suggestions some people are injured with other pedestrians and they cannot be accounted for at the moment. we might be able to hear what holly told us in a second. these are live pictures of what

appears to be happening. blue lights of various emergency service vehicles, as holly said, it will remind people of the appalling events remind people of the appalling eve nts o n remind people of the appalling events on westminster bridge a few weeks ago. a similar incident happened and we know it was terror related, but now it's too early to tell. a major incident is being described via the reuters news agency. various people reporting the same thing. managing editor of the spectator magazine spoke to reuters in the first instance, where we first got warning that this had happened. 0f first got warning that this had happened. of course, at first, it seems like some kind of road traffic accident but clearly there are quite accident but clearly there are quite a few people who seem to have sustained injuries of one kind or another. very little detail coming in at the moment. but, we can hear from what holly jones

in at the moment. but, we can hear from what hollyjones was telling us moments ago, she is a bbc reporter and was on london bridge as the incident unfolded. i am currently on london bridge at the moment, i am on the right—hand side facing away from the right—hand side facing away from the shard. about ten minutes or so ago, a van driver came speeding about 50 mph, veered off the road into the crowds of people that were walking. pedestrians walking along the pavement. he swerved right around me and then hit about five or six people. he hit two people in front of me, and three behind. i would say there are at least four severely injured people. they all have paramedics assisting them at the moment. there are about 20 armed police on the bridge at the moment. iam unaware police on the bridge at the moment. i am unaware as to where the van driver has gone now. it was a white transit van with a solo male driver.

0ne transit van with a solo male driver. one of the victims, a french lady, she is 45 years old. she had a boyfriend with her, she cannot find him at the moment. 0bviously that is very worrying. nobody really knows what is going on. all traffic has been halted. how quickly were emergency services there? police arrived within two minutes. there we re arrived within two minutes. there were several people with camera phones, who had obviously been taking pictures of tower bridge. police arrived within two minutes, ambulances took about eight minutes. i would probably say i was the first person on the scene that called the ambulances. ambulances here within 6-8 ambulances. ambulances here within 6—8 minutes. ambulances. ambulances here within 6-8 minutes. where is the vehicle? i'm unsure as to where the vehicle is. it's probably central committee middle part of the bridge that it impacted the most —— the central,

the middle part of the bridge where it impacted the most pedestrians. it carried on towards the shard area. apologies for the noise, there are helicopters, and at least five or six police boats searching the thames at the moment. all of the traffic is halted on london bridge. you say police boats are out on the river, why would that be? from the way that i saw what happened, it all happened very quickly. there were about three people behind me. three french people, one of whom is the victim, and is being treated by paramedics at the moment. she is severely injured, she had two other people with her. she told me, in french," i don't know where the two other people are". police are

checking the thames. they were right next to the edge of the bridge. potentially, they could have been thrown over. i just potentially, they could have been thrown over. ijust don't know. presumably the boats are looking for her now. of course this is horribly reminiscent of what happened on westminster bridge weeks ago. i can hear sirens in the background. how many more emergency service vehicles are now arriving? i can see four ambulances at the moment. five police cars. they tend to be at each end of the bridge. 0ne undercover police car in the centre of the bridge where i am standing now. there are armed guards with guns, who are running up and down. i'm not sure exactly what they are doing. 0bviously, sure exactly what they are doing. obviously, as soon as this happened, the first thing it reminded me of was the westminster attack. studio:

you are watching bbc news. just in the last few minutes, a major incident has been reported in central london. we have been hearing from bbc reporter hollyjones who was at the scene at the time as it unfolded. a van had driven across london bridge, right in the heart of the capital city. pedestrians had been knocked down. 0ur reporter greg dawson is here with me, watching this and fault. it is onlyjust being reported in the last few minutes. slowly run through what we know so far? -- unfold. we got reports just after ten o'clock this evening of an event at london bridge. eyewitnesses corroborating the same information on social media is that a white van mounted the

pavement and hit pedestrians. we don't yet have a precise figure but we are getting reports of police boats on the river thames. reports that some pedestrians are unaccounted for. clearly, there is a lot of panic in the area right now. you would imagine police are taking precautions, the london bridge station is closed and metropolitan police have confirmed they are dealing with an incident. clearly, it would be very busy in that area ona it would be very busy in that area on a saturday night. london bridge station is the gateway to south—east london and into kent, with overland train stations. it is a tube station as well. you have borough market and several restaurants and pubs in the area. it is a tourist attraction. 0n area. it is a tourist attraction. 0n a saturday night it would have been very busy. we are looking at the metropolitan police twitter feed. very busy. we are looking at the metropolitan police twitterfeed. 13 minutes ago, they said they were

dealing with an incident on london bridge, they will update the twitter feed when they have more information. it has been retweeted thousands of times already. horribly reminiscent of what we saw on westminster bridge only a few weeks ago? yes, in march, in the middle of the day, that incident in westminster where that car mounted the pavement, knocked people down. we now know what happened there. what we will be trying to ascertain, and what police will be trying to ascertain in the next few hours is, was this deliberate? who is behind it? is this an isolated incident? at the moment we do not know. we will look at live pictures in the middle of london. as we have been saying, traffic has been stopped from crossing the bridge, normally a busy way of crossing north to south of

the river, blue lights, clearly, many emergency service vehicles with police first on the scene within a couple of minutes of them being called? many journalists, because right by london bridge station is the offices of news international, the sunday times newspaper and the sun newspaper as well. they are staying up late to put their papers to bed. many would be leaving the office and we have heard from a lot office and we have heard from a lot of journalists at the scene office and we have heard from a lot ofjournalists at the scene who are our eyes and witnesses to this as well as police. —— who are eyewitnesses. we understand from our reporter hollyjones, eyewitnesses. we understand from our reporter holly jones, who eyewitnesses. we understand from our reporter hollyjones, who happened to be on the bridge at the time, and was able to raise the alarm. ambulances arrived, and paramedics we re ambulances arrived, and paramedics were able to get attention. it does seem that several people have sustained injuries of some sort? according to some of the images are of course not verified at this stage, they are being treated by

journalists. the images show several people being treated, up to ten and possibly more being treated for injuries on the pavement on the south side of london bridge. that is where it would appear a majority of those people have been injured. we do not know what happened to the van, it does not seem that the driver stopped? there are some reports of police chasing a van, but in the confusion of many police fans arriving, we have reports of up to ten police cars heading into the area. you can imagine at this stage, to verify whether the ban is there, whether the person driving it has been stopped, we are still not sure. there have been reports that the driver sped off, having knocked over these pedestrians. they may have hit five or six people and the suggestion was that maybe four of them had been